CynicalNoobGroupbie

Numbers are fascinating eh?I have no idea where you are taking this but I am fully signed on this ride!

Don't you think it's time to talk about Arnav a little? We have got full info on Khushi now and want to know more about Arnav. I am unable to understand his fascination with her. Is it stemmed out of an old memory or is she a manifestation of something he has lost?

CN

PS: Idea to write daily a little was brilliant. I am little annoyed with Flashpoint so am keeping the comment short.

QuiteThoughtfulNewbie

Numbers are fascinating eh?I have no idea where you are taking this but I am fully signed on this ride!

Don't you think it's time to talk about Arnav a little? We have got full info on Khushi now and want to know more about Arnav. I am unable to understand his fascination with her. Is it stemmed out of an old memory or is she a manifestation of something he has lost?

CN

PS: Idea to write daily a little was brilliant. I am little annoyed with Flashpoint so am keeping the comment short.

Arnav in this story and Khushi in yours should probably get together and go on a date or something. They are less complex creatures but I believe they are more...unfathomed. It's hard to figure out what is going on in Khushi's head here and Arnav's head in yours.

Is it in their past or its their personality which is driving them to be what they are? I guess it's something that needs exploration, isn't it?

QT

PS: Do you sense convergence of the characters around? It's oddly desecrating yet fascinating at the turn of events.

QuiteThoughtfulNewbie

"Are you sure it was bus numbered eight which you took to that place?" Arnav asked.

"You have already asked me this three times. Why are you
asking again?" She asked looking down the street.

"But this board doesn't show that number Khushi. Are you
sure it was something else?" Arnav asked again thumbing at the board that
displayed bus schedule. She threw him a dirty look. He raised his hands in
surrender.

"I know the bus which I took to that place Arnav," she said
not sounding too confident anymore. They had asked a roasted-peanuts vendor who
stood next to bus stop about the bus and had received a negative response.

After fifty five minutes of wait, Khushi sighed deeply. She
knew that the bus wasn't going to come. Something told her that it wasn't meant to come then.

"I am going home," she said standing up and dusting her
back. Arnav noted the sheer disappointment in her voice.

She had talked incessantly about a diner she had been to
which, in his view, was non-existent. But he didn't dare tell her that.

"Khushi," he called out. She stopped but didn't turn around.
"How about we look at city map with all possible bus routes charted and using
the time it took you to reach that place, we should narrow down two kilometer
radius." Arnav said. She turned around then. "Preferably over a cup of coffee,"
He added as an afterthought.

"Coffee sounds nice," she said with a faint smile.

His smile grew.

*****

"Do you like this place?" Arnav asked watching Khushi's
enthusiasm at the bookstore. They had stopped by a bookstore to purchase city
map before going for a coffee. Khushi had walked past him and was going from
aisle to aisle checking out what the store had to offer.

She sighed, running a hand through the hair at the end of
her braid. "We don't have bookstores like these from where I come from." She
said running a finger down the spine of a longish book.

It was a book of maps.

"I always found maps very fascinating," she said turning
pages slowly and stopping momentarily to run her fingers on the opened page. "I
tried creating a map of my town once, you know?"

"Why?" He asked.

"During summer holidays I worked along with my father in his
shop in morning making sweets and learning about them. During evenings, I
walked around town charting down lanes and streets and alleys. You know there
was no real public transportation in my town? We could walk from one end of the
town to the other in matter of two hours."

"Good times?" He asked leaning and watching her read the
book distractedly. Her eyes were fixed on the page but they weren't taking in
anything. Her memories were active on her mind then.

"Uncomplicated times," she said, her fingers caressed the
opened page.

"Do you still have that map?" He asked her imagining seeing
a much younger self wandering around the streets and taking notes, sitting in a
corner and getting a perspective.

"I think I do. But the map is not accurate anymore."

"Why do you think that?" He was curious, like always.

"Because I have changed," she replied with a humorless
smile. Arnav looked at her unblinking.

"I don't understand." The feeling of being ignoramus around
her was becoming more and more frequent. Her words weren't profound but it was
the context which was difficult to get a handle on.

"I was sixteen when I worked on that map Arnav. Over the
years I have gained knowledge and I have seen more of this world, gaining
experiences while interacting with people, which has installed few prejudices
in me. With these in place, it's hard to view the map as it was before. Now I will
see only inaccuracies and memories of a summer." She said placing the book in
its original place.

"Inaccuracy is little harsh, don't you think?" He wanted to
know more. He was willing to admit to himself that he wanted to hear her talk
about her obscure hobby and her non-linear thought process. He removed the book
from the shelf she had recently placed, on cartography – mapmaking and turned
it to see the map of the world. So that's what had triggered her memory.

"The map of the world you see on the back of this book is
Mercator projection. This map has been accused of being ethnically prejudiced. See
Greenland over here?" She said pointing to the whitened landmass at the top.

"What about it?" Arnav asked.

"Now see Australia all the way down here," she said pointing
to bottom right corner of the map.

"Australia is smaller than Greenland? Really?" He asked her.

"No, Australia is three times bigger than Greenland." She
said smiling. "Do you now understand?" She asked.

"The guy who made this map loved…Greenland?" He said with a
hint of sarcasm.

"No. But the guy did love Europe," she said. Arnav looked at
her surprised.

"Well, not really. The mathematics of Mercator projection
gives rise to this kind of interpretation. Some accusations go as far as ethnic
supremacy of the west and implied discrimination against third world countries."
Khushi said. She looked as if she was enjoying herself and he couldn't help but
smile at her enthusiasm at a strange subject. He never met a person who loved
to read maps.

"I am sorry we couldn't go to the diner today," he said. Disappointment
had marred her features and it had found an abode in corner of her eyes. But
the sadness – he had no idea where that stemmed from.

"I really wanted to show you that place. You would have
loved it there; the place, the people and…everything that is and that isn't," she
said leaning on the shelf.

They stood there, leaning on the shelf face to face, in the
deserted aisle that housed obscure books and rarely attracted humanity.

"It's getting late. We should probably go," she said
breaking the gaze and walked past him. He looked at the book in his hands and
then looked at the place that Khushi was previously occupying.

Coffee should be interesting, he mused idly as he walked to
the cashier to pay for the map and the book – the book she was smitten with.

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